Monthly Archives: September 2013

For the sake of scientific experimentation, my assistant and I finally got around to heating up a can of Campbell’s Spaghetti the other night. Did I say “assistant?” I meant “companion.” Well, “wife” actually.

Neither of us were terribly impressed. Mrs. H thought that it smelled and tasted like the Spaghetti Os she remembered eating at a friend’s house when she was a kid. As for me, I have almost no memory of Spaghetti Os. Either my mom never served them or I simply blocked them out of my mind.

I can say that what we ate was not what you would call authentic Italian cuisine, not even if Olive Garden is your idea of authentic. The sauce is a bland, sticky, orange-hued concoction, not unlike what you might get if you mixed Campbell’s Tomato Soup with Cheez Whiz. The pasta was overcooked to the consistency of Jell-O. I’m hard pressed to explain how it is that it doesn’t simply disintegrate in the can.

Now I realize that Jon Pertwee’s recipe calls for the Heinz Spaghetti with Tomato and Cheese Sauce, but if it’s anything like the Campbell’s version, I have to wonder how Jon Pertwee, sophisticated man of the world that he was, could have given us a recipe based on this stuff. I’m starting to think that maybe he was never a canned spaghetti buff at all, but instead simply lending his image to Heinz in exchange for an endorsement fee.

Was he really just in it for the money? Was his 1976 ode to Heinz Noodle Doodles (set to Darren’s visuals below) something less than an expression of heartfelt affection for pasta in a can?

Would Pertwee have perhaps preferred a grapefruit or an egg for breakfast instead of a big bowl of Sugar Smacks?For even more timeless energy, enjoy with a double espresso.

But Pertwee was Dr. Who, for heaven’s sake! The Doctor doesn’t save the universe for commercial gain. He doesn’t even carry cash. I can’t imagine Doctor Who allowing his name to get plastered onto a can of substandard pasta in exchange for a promotional fee.

What, no Ood?

Oh.

I may have to go another way with this. Maybe make my own sauce and use a decent pasta, cooked al dente. Though probably not Barilla. Doctor Who’s gay-friendliness doesn’t seem like a good fit. A local brand will do.

You can’t make spaghetti flan without Heinz Spaghetti with Tomato and Cheese Sauce. Unfortunately, the venerable spaghetti with cheese product appears to have gone the way of the Dodo, at least in the US and the UK. In the US, the only Heinz spaghetti I can find is Spaghetti in Tomato Sauce (without cheese!) and that’s imported from Britain, but at least you can buy it by the case. In the UK, Heinz offers a wide range of tinned pasta varieties like Spaghetti PLUS Pepperoni or My Little Pony Pasta Shapes but from what I can tell, there’s no Spaghetti with Tomato and Cheese sauce on offer.

Dodo Chaplet, seen here wearing a Spaghetti Os skirt.

But all is not lost. There are places around the world where you can still get a can of Heinz Spaghetti with cheese in it. The Australians even have a version with extra cheese! New Zealanders have it too. Alas, my Kickstarter to raise funds for a Australian spaghetti fact-finding junket never got off the ground.

But as luck would have it, we took a family vacation to Canada this past summer. And there, on the shelf of a convenience store in the small Bay of Fundy village of Alma, sat cans of Heinz Spaghetti in Tomato Sauce With Cheese conveniently located next to the toilet paper and feminine care products. Fantastic!

And it’s bilingual!

If a trip to Australia or Canada isn’t practical, there are other options for the spagflan enthusiast. Maybe the simplest thing to do is to use regular Heinz Spaghetti (without cheese) and add your own cheese. Or you might use another brand like Campbell’s (formerly Franco-American) Spaghetti in Tomato and Cheese Sauce.

WWJPD? Research and analysis, of course. Here are the ingredients and nutrition facts for some of the options available in the US plus the Canadian import. I’ll try a couple of them, but I need to pick up some flan rings first.

What would Jon Pertwee do? That question will be the guiding principle of this blog.

WWJPD?

When faced with a difficult decision in my quest to reintroduce spaghetti flan to the world, I shall ask myself how Jon Pertwee would handle the situation. What kind of cheese would Jon Pertwee—or specifically Jon Pertwee’s Third Doctor—put on top of spaghetti flan? What sort of wine would he serve with his culinary masterpiece? Should I take a hovercraft or the Whomobile to the supermarket? Can I open a can of spaghetti with a Venusian karate chop?

If I do what Jon Pertwee would do, it’s certain to be the wisest course of action. Indeed, the world would be a better place if everyone stopped to ask “WWJPD?” in their daily lives. If nothing else, we’d all be wearing a lot more velvet.

If you’re a long-time Doctor Who fan, you know Jon Pertwee as the actor who played the third incarnation of the Doctor in the early 1970’s. What you may not be aware of is that Pertwee is a culinary wizard with canned spaghetti, or at least that’s what this advertisement would have you believe.

Jon Pertwee’s Spaghetti Flan

The 1962 magazine ad features British television celebrities of the day each with a recipe made using Heinz Spaghetti with Tomato and Cheese Sauce. The celebrity at bottom left is the man who would go on to play the Third Doctor, Jon Pertwee, with his recipe for spaghetti flan.

Bacon, cheese and canned spaghetti. Could it be anything but delicious?

And just imagine: fifty years ago the cast and crew who first brought Doctor Who to our screens might have come home from a hard day’s work at Television Centre to make this very dish. In fact, it’s not hard to believe that spaghetti has had a huge influence on Doctor Who over the years.

You were supposed to bring the meatballs.

And it would appear that spaghetti continues to have an impact on the new series as well.

Oodles of Noodles

While I’d like to be able to bring you a documentary film on this historic recipe, I have neither the budget, time, nor expertise to produce something of the caliber that it deserves. What I will do is give Jon Pertwee’s Spaghetti Flan a new life in my kitchen and share the results on this short-lived blog. Next post: the search for Heinz Spaghetti with Tomato and Cheese Sauce.